Nailed: Ten Christian Myths that show Jesus never existed

[pakeha]

I hope the Hogmanay treated you as well as the 12 grapes did me, Craig B!

I don't know. It seems to me that multiple attestation and "embarrassment" would be applicable as criteria to any sources.

David Mo answered you much more eloquently than can I

Strictly speaking, we have only two independent fonts: Mark and Q, if the most common opinion is admitted here....[respectfully snipped]...
The problem is that almost all the events related in the New Testament have these doctrinal motivations and we can't know if they are real or invented with doctrinal purposes if we only consider the multiple attestation criterion.
For example: the three synoptic involve the Sanhedrin in the Jesus' trial. We can consider this as acceptable if we consider the multiple attestation criterion. But we also know that the evangelists' agenda includes a strong anti-Judaism. The inclusion of Sanhedrin would likely be a result of intent to involve the representative institutions of Judaism in Jesus' death. We cannot solve this alternative by resorting to the multiple attestation criterion.

But back to your comment "It seems to me that multiple attestation and "embarrassment" would be applicable as criteria to any sources."

You'd think so, Craig B, and indeed, I thought so til I learned the embarrassment criterion is basically an method of bible study, not used in other historical research, correct me if I'm wrong, please.

Can the multiple attestation criterion be properly applied to the NT to determine any probability or plausibility to Jesus' historicity?
I have serious doubts it can, but I'm more than happy to change my mind.
It wouldn't be the first time I've changed my mind and I hope not the last, either.

 

[pakeha]

...As to the James Ossuary: I pretty much stopped following the story. Oded Golan was found not guilty a year ago or so. He managed to get the guy who had actually made the forgery out of the country so he didn't testify at the trial. Even with that I was surprised to see him found not guilty. ...

Thanks for the up-date, davefoc.
Such an outcome doesn't surprise me in the least; what you've described is something I've seen happen more than once, but in an entirely different context.

What does seem spooky to me out is how just about all archeological finds concerning 1st century Judea peter out into fakery, fraud and forgery.

Except those marvelous courses upon which Herod built the Second Temple.

 

[IanS]

No, Jesus is not strangely unique.
There are several figures of history where evidence is just as thin or thinner.

Is the historical field the only field that accepts evidences thinner than other fields?
Absolutely.
Why?

Because to not do so is, effectively, not to have history in large part.
Most of the ancient record is fragmentary and bias; on a good day.

Because of the ignition of the cults surrounding Jesus, we actually have more content to look at regarding the cults and their ideas of this figure than we typically do of most figures.

Does that prove existence?
Nope.

Is Jesus historically proven to exist or to not have existed?
Nope.

Is Jesus accepted into the historical record as existent by inheritance of the positive?
Yep, like everything.

Has Jesus been proven to the negative successfully yet?
Nope; and complaining that the "evidence for Jesus is poor or non-existent" doesn't prove a negative. It just begs justification for the positive, and that just means someone doesn't understand how the Historical method works.

Round and round we go...I think you probably full well understand all of this at this point.
You may not like it; but that's how it is.

The historical method, due to the crappy quality of material we find and the crappy quality of our ability to find material, is horribly incapable of working in the opposite position.

Well the sort of reason we keep going "round & round", is because for example you are yet again repeatedly talking about "proof" when that is absolutely no part of this discussion at all. Look - there is no such as literal proof of anything - and we learned that in the 1920's with the discovery of quantum mechanics as the "Theory" describing all matter and energy thoughout this entire universe. OK? So, no "PROOF"!!

We are talking about "evidence". Not about "proof".

The problem here is - zero reliable or credible evidence of a living Jesus. And despite all these many thousands of posts, and hundreds of claims that "expert historians" are quite certain about the evidence and that we must not question them, not a single person here has ever been able to cite any credible reliable evidence from any of these so-called "expert scholars". None at all.

And then you say -

No, Jesus is not strangely unique.
There are several figures of history where evidence is just as thin or thinner.

Is the historical field the only field that accepts evidences thinner than other fields?
Absolutely.
Why?

Because to not do so is, effectively, not to have history in large part.
Most of the ancient record is fragmentary and bias; on a good day.

I did not say Jesus was unique. What I said is this seems to be the only subject where academics believe a vitally important figure was real to the point of saying it's a "certainty", and yet where they cannot produce a single shred of credible reliable evidence for that claim, and where to the contrary there is an absolute mountain of evidence showing that (a)their only primary source of any original accounts of Jesus have been shown to be certainly impossible untrue fiction in virtually every one of their central defining stories about Jesus, where (b)apart from Paul, all the gospel writers were entirety anonymous and admittedly never knew Jesus or anything about him but believed there were other unknown informants of the unspecified past who were also not claimed ever to have known Jesus but who were assumed to have heard stories about yet more distant people who were thought to have once known Jesus, albeit not a single such person was ever produced, and where (c) the only other source in Paul's letters makes clear that Paul had never known anyone called Jesus either, and where all his letters repeatedly insist that his knowledge of Jesus "came from no man" and "consulted no man", but was instead known to Paul by what he called "revelation" where "God was pleased to reveal his Son in me", from what he says was "according to scripture" and where he said it was because "it is written".

Which other vitally important figures from any era of history are said by any real “Historians” to be definitely real, on the basis of absolutely hopeless “evidence” like that? Can you name anyone who is agreed to be real on such evidence?

And if you think you can name any other such believed person, do keep in mind that this has to be a person who is also (apart from all the above) famous in that primary biblical writing purely and entirely for his miraculous supernatural nature “proving” that he was the long awaited (from at least 500BC) messianic child of God in heaven. Jesus was not famous for anything else except all the miracles, wonders and signs that comprise all of the bible stories about him … and before anyone says that not all the bible stories are miraculous and that stories such as the last supper do not involve miracles, those other non-miracle stories all involve highly religious prophetic meanings, insights, wonders, and signs etc …. they are all very clearly part of the miraculous divine fabric of the figure believed in (but never known by anyone) as the supernatural child of God …

… so which other figures can you name in all of history that are like that, and where real historians (not “bible scholars” in religious studies departments) do in fact insist that such evidence is good enough to say they were real figures?

And whilst you doing that, do keep in mind also that Jesus is probably the single most important figure in all of human history, who's existence is the entire basis of the vast power and influence that the Christian church has over the daily lives of millions of people worldwide today. And someone of that enormous direct daily current importance most definitely does need to be known from pretty solid reliable evidence. So any remotely comparable figures you might propose do also need to be figures who do at least have some direct importance in the lives of ordinary people today … not just some barely known philosopher or whoever as a figure that nobody outside certain tiny niche areas of academia cares about at all and where their existence or non-existence is of absolutely no comparable relevance to anyone at all (because nobody can be bothered to argue about any irrelevant figure like being claimed from virtually non-existent evidence).

 

[eight bits]

Brainache

Oh, that's right, he isn't associated with a University...

So, this remark defuses the impression that the "historical method" is useful only in a specified work environment, for the problems peculiar to that environment?

Jayson R

The Norseman's observation that there was no use of the idea of "null hypothesis" in the Bayesian book he is reading is the usual thing. "Null hypothesis" is used almost entirely in a competing kind of statistical inference, not in Bayes.

In the other kind of inference, "null hypothesis" isn't a "negative," but a specific situation. If the observed results would be sufficiently unlikely if the null hypothesis were true, then we acquire some confidence that the null hypothesis isn't true. We don't assume it's untrue, and in the particular approach to statistics that uses the technique, we never conclude that it is true. It is a hypothetical whose use furnishes a standard for comparison with other possible explanations of the observed data.

If I leave out a piece of information, or enter the information in with the wrong premise, then the probability comes out entirely wrong.

A fundamental part of Bayesian practice is to keep track of what information the posterior probability takes into account. If you are overlooking information, then this is not Bayes' problem, it is your problem. If you are cherrypicking or otherwise trimming the data, then I would be suspicious of your "answer" regardless of what method you used to analyze it.

Furthermore, running Bayes Theorem on Jesus assumes we have all of the information there is to have on Jesus.

No. The posterior probability is based on the information you have taken into account. Obviously, if additional evidence becomes available, then you will revise your estimates.

What about that impresses you as irrational? Or perhaps I should be asking what method do you propose that would get the right answer in 1930 based on evidence that won't be seen until 2020? Does that performance not impress you as magical?

...non-applicable to entry into the human timeline.

You actually can write that sentence, and see no relationship between a literally geometrically linear representation and the linear narratives so beloved in the humanities departments?

There is one true timeline, but you don't know which of unboundedly many possible timelines actually occurred. There is no obligation to pick one and ignore the rest. Uncertainty means that, so far as the speaker knows, there is more than one serious possibility for what actually happened. There is nothing irrational about choosing knowledge representations that reflect that.

For example, someone could choose a distibution of confidence over the ensemble of seriously possible worlds (or if you prefer, timelines), which Bayes offers one way of managing.

 

[Stone]

As to the James Ossuary: I pretty much stopped following the story. Oded Golan was found not guilty a year ago or so. He managed to get the guy who had actually made the forgery out of the country so he didn't testify at the trial. Even with that I was surprised to see him found not guilty. Having a house full of forgery tools and a bunch of forged stuff lying around seem like it was incriminating enough for a guilty verdict to me. ETA: And of course the testimony of a lot of specialists on the various issues that they thought the ossuary inscription was forged as well.

And yet you reject all specialists out of hand on the chief questions raised in this thread! Do you know how hypocritical you sound?

Stone

 

[tsig]

I hope the Hogmanay treated you as well as the 12 grapes did me, Craig B!



David Mo answered you much more eloquently than can I



But back to your comment "It seems to me that multiple attestation and "embarrassment" would be applicable as criteria to any sources."

You'd think so, Craig B, and indeed, I thought so til I learned the embarrassment criterion is basically an method of bible study, not used in other historical research, correct me if I'm wrong, please.

Can the multiple attestation criterion be properly applied to the NT to determine any probability or plausibility to Jesus' historicity?
I have serious doubts it can, but I'm more than happy to change my mind.
It wouldn't be the first time I've changed my mind and I hope not the last, either.

Those two "tools" are widely used by Christian theologians and apologists, so it's interesting seeing them used by skeptics to quote mine an HJ out of the bible.

The criterion of embarrassment looks a lot like begging the question and mind reading early Christians. In order to determine that an event would be embarrassing to a group you need to know the beliefs of that group, also saying that they wrote about Christ crucified even though it would be embarrassing to have their savior crucified therefore the crucifixion must have occurred, assumes the crucifixion occurred.


Multiple attestation seems to mean that more than one gospel mentions something, not too convincing if you don't already think there's truth in the bible.

 

[The Norseman]

Brainache


So, this remark defuses the impression that the "historical method" is useful only in a specified work environment, for the problems peculiar to that environment?

Jayson R

The Norseman's observation that there was no use of the idea of "null hypothesis" in the Bayesian book he is reading is the usual thing. "Null hypothesis" is used almost entirely in a competing kind of statistical inference, not in Bayes.

In the other kind of inference, "null hypothesis" isn't a "negative," but a specific situation. If the observed results would be sufficiently unlikely if the null hypothesis were true, then we acquire some confidence that the null hypothesis isn't true. We don't assume it's untrue, and in the particular approach to statistics that uses the technique, we never conclude that it is true. It is a hypothetical whose use furnishes a standard for comparison with other possible explanations of the observed data.


A fundamental part of Bayesian practice is to keep track of what information the posterior probability takes into account. If you are overlooking information, then this is not Bayes' problem, it is your problem. If you are cherrypicking or otherwise trimming the data, then I would be suspicious of your "answer" regardless of what method you used to analyze it.


No. The posterior probability is based on the information you have taken into account. Obviously, if additional evidence becomes available, then you will revise your estimates.

What about that impresses you as irrational? Or perhaps I should be asking what method do you propose that would get the right answer in 1930 based on evidence that won't be seen until 2020? Does that performance not impress you as magical?


You actually can write that sentence, and see no relationship between a literally geometrically linear representation and the linear narratives so beloved in the humanities departments?

There is one true timeline, but you don't know which of unboundedly many possible timelines actually occurred. There is no obligation to pick one and ignore the rest. Uncertainty means that, so far as the speaker knows, there is more than one serious possibility for what actually happened. There is nothing irrational about choosing knowledge representations that reflect that.

For example, someone could choose a distibution of confidence over the ensemble of seriously possible worlds (or if you prefer, timelines), which Bayes offers one way of managing.

Thank you! That was very well said.

So far from what I understand from Carrier's book is that he takes into consideration all aspects of Jesus, including the fantastical elements. He states that because nothing can ever be absolutely ruled out, even the fantastical elements are given a slight probability in Bayes' Theorem.

In other words, again with my limited understanding, nothing is left out; its all useful information at arriving at a potential truth.

 

[Craig B]

... Multiple attestation seems to mean that more than one gospel mentions something, not too convincing if you don't already think there's truth in the bible.

More than one source, perhaps, as the gospels may well be composite works! as discussed. Also, leaving aside the open question whether the examples of multiple attestation assumed for the gospels are authentic; the principle itself seems sound enough. If two independent sources tell me Hannibal crossed the Alps, or Elagabalus invented the whoopee cushion, that's better than a single source doing so. It's merely the principle of corroboration. By the way, I believe there may well be accurate statements in the Bible. It's finding them that is the problem. But the whole work is not an intentional mass of lies concocted for the purpose of deceiving people.

It contains plenty myths, and myths are sometimes based on historical fact.

 

[Belz...]

Multiple attestation seems to mean that more than one gospel mentions something, not too convincing if you don't already think there's truth in the bible.

It seems counter-productive to assume that it contains no truth at all, however.

 

[tsig]

More than one source, perhaps, as the gospels may well be composite works! as discussed. Also, leaving aside the open question whether the examples of multiple attestation assumed for the gospels are authentic; the principle itself seems sound enough. If two independent sources tell me Hannibal crossed the Alps, or Elagabalus invented the whoopee cushion, that's better than a single source doing so. It's merely the principle of corroboration. By the way, I believe there may well be accurate statements in the Bible. It's finding them that is the problem. But the whole work is not an intentional mass of lies concocted for the purpose of deceiving people. It contains plenty myths, and myths are sometimes based on historical fact.

I hilited the problem with the gospels.

Second hilite, your straw man.

 

[tsig]

It seems counter-productive to assume that it contains no truth at all, however.

Why?

 

[eight bits]

The Norseman

In other words, again with my limited understanding, nothing is left out; its all useful information at arriving at a potential truth.

That's a good summary of the idea.

Do not be discouraged that it is rough sledding the first time around. In our culture, almost nobody gets to be raised on the Bayesian (or other closely related) approaches to thinking about uncertianty. It can become "second nature," but almost everybody has to struggle with it before reaching the point where they can agree with Laplace that it is "nothing but common sense reduced to calculation."

 

[Craig B]

I hilited the problem with the gospels.

Indeed. I freely acknowledge that.

Second hilite, your straw man.

It is not a comment on your own views, but on the ideas of certain others.

 

[The Norseman]

The Norseman


That's a good summary of the idea.

Thank you. That gives me slight hope that I will eventually be able to understand it.

Do not be discouraged that it is rough sledding the first time around. In our culture, almost nobody gets to be raised on the Bayesian (or other closely related) approaches to thinking about uncertianty. It can become "second nature," but almost everybody has to struggle with it before reaching the point where they can agree with Laplace that it is "nothing but common sense reduced to calculation."

I don't know anybody in real life that would be able to explain this to me. I find that I learn things much easier when I interact with somebody face to face. I should eventually get it though. I find the concept useful and interesting.

 

[davefoc]

And yet you reject all specialists out of hand on the chief questions raised in this thread! Do you know how hypocritical you sound?

Stone

Like everybody else, hypocrisy is always a possible explanation for my views. I don't think we can ever be sure we've out thought our biases and when there is an equivocal nature to the available evidence the possibility that biases are driving our conclusions goes up significantly.

I will give you the reasons I think that I trust the conclusions of one group of experts more than another in this case. I don't expect my reasons to make a persuasive case to you that hypocrisy isn't the real driver.

The experts that I found most credible on the James Ossuary issue used hard science reasons to support their view that the Ossuary was forged. They tested the patina chemically on the inscription and the box and compared the results. They examined the sharpness of the inscription and compared that with sharpness of the image on the other side of the box that was believed to have been inscribed at roughly the time the box was made. The information they put forth in their separate writings could be viewed as independent data points about the possibility that the inscription was forged.

The findings that the inscription on the box was a hoax was consistent with the fact that the box was found to have passed through the hands of a dealer in antiquities who was believed to have forged other artifacts previously and when his house was searched tools that could have been used in the making of forgeries were found.

The experts that claim the inscription was not forged all were associated with the magazine, Biblical Archeology Review. I could not find where they had submitted articles for peer review (with one possible exception and I couldn't find where his paper had been published), but they had written articles for a magazine that was campaigning to promote the authenticity of the box and that was not publishing any of the articles by people that disputed the authenticity of the inscription.

I would contrast the above reasons that I believe the specialists that supported the conclusion the James Ossuary was a hoax with the reasons I am skeptical of the specialists that argue that the existence of an HJ is either a certainty or extremely likely.

Where is the evidence that they produce that can rise to the level of scientific analysis of an artifact? Of course, there is nothing like that available. What is available are writings by unknown people separated in time, distance, language and culture from the events they describe who were promoting a religion. Although there were numerous people that contributed to the writing of the early Christian documents it is most likely that none of the them ever had direct contact with the HJ and the most likely the situation is that either zero or one of them had direct contact with people that had known the HJ.

And despite the fact that there are numerous people that wrote the NT Gospels it is likely that only gMark represents an independent source of information about oral traditions that might have conveyed accurate information. I realize that some have suggested here that Q might be another possibility, and that idea can't be ruled out but the possibility that there was a Q document has been shown to be much less likely than it was thought to be previously.

But still, why not trust these experts Stone thinks make up this grand consensus about the extremely likely existence of an HJ? Because instead of pointing to solid data points for their arguments they almost always begin their arguments with a description of how unreliable the NT texts are as a source of history but then go on to argue that despite that, all reputable experts agree that an HJ existed. Why lead with that as your evidence? Relying on that kind of evidence is relying on a method that has done more to suppress truth than to reveal it. Galileo went to jail because a bunch of people claimed that the scientific consensus was more credible than actual facts. All sorts of scientific consensuses have eventually been shown to be wrong. If the scientific community relied on this circular everybody believes it approach to science there would be no science.

And what is the evidence when the HJ-existed-for-sure experts get around to describing it instead of trying to claim it exists because all reputable scholars agree it does?

It is damn slim. There are the writings of Paul believed to be genuine, but they exist completely without external corroboration and the possibilities that Paul lied, Paul was fooled, Paul's writings were forged and that Paul didn't exist can't be disproved.

After Paul there are the Gospels. John is usually discounted entirely because of its late date and contradictions with the other three Gospels. And Matthew and Luke seem to be completely dependent on Mark for the bulk of their story except when they make up stories like the birth narrative and the trial narrative. If there is truthful information in Matthew and Luke beyond what is in Mark, how could one determine what that is? One might make some guesses about plausibility and criteria of embarrassment but does any of that lead to evidence strong enough to support a conclusion that it is extremely likely that an HJ existed. I don't think so.

And after the Gospels there are the other NT books. Is there anything probative in them with regard to the existence of an HJ. I haven't seen those arguments if they exist. Although James is sometimes put forth as an example of a book that may have been derived from a Jesus oriented Palestinian sect. Maybe, the evidence seems speculative to me.

And after the other NT books there are the alleged non-biblical corroborations of the NT. When one cuts out the crap here there are only two that are possibilities: Josephus and Tacitus. These sources have been argued endlessly. Neither individual could have been a witness to an HJ. Both at best might be a witness to Christians at a fairly early date. There is great dispute about the authenticity of the Josephus writings and my guess is that the arguments that dispute authenticity are correct. But regardless of my guess about this it is clear there are significant reasons to doubt the authenticity of Josephus on the HJ and as such Joshephus' alleged writings about the HJ don't contribute much support to a case that it is extremely likely that an HJ existed.

 

[pakeha]

Thanks for taking the time to explain the Ossuary question, davefoc. I appreciated it a lot and can understand your frustration at the court decision.

 

[Belz...]

Why?

... because, obviously, you might miss something important if you assume it's beyond scrutiny, either way. You know, skepticism !

 

[tsig]

Those two "tools" are widely used by Christian theologians and apologists, so it's interesting seeing them used by skeptics to quote mine an HJ out of the bible.

The criterion of embarrassment looks a lot like begging the question and mind reading early Christians. In order to determine that an event would be embarrassing to a group you need to know the beliefs of that group, also saying that they wrote about Christ crucified even though it would be embarrassing to have their savior crucified therefore the crucifixion must have occurred, assumes the crucifixion occurred.


Multiple attestation seems to mean that more than one gospel mentions something, not too convincing if you don't already think there's truth in the bible.

... because, obviously, you might miss something important if you assume it's beyond scrutiny, either way. You know, skepticism !

Because two or more gospels mention something that makes it important? You are still using the bible to prove the bible.

 

[IanS]

An analysis of the gospels can indeed yield credible, though not conclusive, evidence for Jesus. This has been discussed, including the criteria by which it is discerned.

By "credible evidence" from the gospels, I can only assume you must mean whatever is left after all the "incredible" physically impossible stuff has somehow been discarded.

But even if you had some justification for simply discarding all the vast mass of stuff that you/anyone no longer wants to believe, what does that leave you with? It leaves you with a set of individual "pericopes" where instead of doing something miraculous, Jesus reveals some amazing or otherwise insightful or prophetic words of wisdom which are iirc always directly concerned with the religious beliefs and meanings that so concerned all the gospel writers. And where even those remaining religious prophetic insights, "wonders and signs" can iirc very often be traced back to what those gospel authors thought had been written long before as the true meaning of various sentences in various books of the Old Testament.

And you think that somehow turns the gospels into credible evidence showing those gospel writers were talking about someone they knew to be a real person? Even though not one of those gospel authors had ever known Jesus in any earthly way at all, where all those writers were themselves entirely anonymous, where they were at best only relaying on previous legend told by other even more anonymous people who themselves had never known Jesus either, but where they told stories of still more distant people who had once been disciples of Jesus, but where no such personal witnesses to Jesus were ever produced or ever quoted as having given any comment at all about Jesus to any of those anonymous gospel writers. And you think is reliable evidence?

And that’s apart from the fact that we do not have any gospels claimed to have been originally written anywhere near the 1st century lifetime of Jesus. Instead afaik the earliest fully readable copies that show the details of what biblical scholars quote and rely on, apparently date to Christian devotional copying from the 4th century onwards (and mostly from the 6th century and later) …

… and you are trying to tell people here that gospel writing is credible as genuine evidence of what those anonymous writers knew of a real human Jesus? ... … you must be kidding!

 

[dejudge]

After Paul there are the Gospels.

Why are you making the same fallacious claims when you have no evidence at all and know there is no evidence?

1. If Jesus did exist the Gospel MUST have come BEFORE Paul.

2. Jesus PREACHED the Gospel BEFORE Paul in the Bible.

3. Paul was a PERSECUTOR BEFORE he preached the Gospel in the Bible.

4. Paul PERSECUTED those who PREACHED the GOSPEL in the Bible.

5. PAUL wrote the Epistles AFTER Churches were ALREADY developed.

6. There are apologetics writer who knew the Gospel but NOT Paul.

7. ALL Apologetics that mentioned Paul ALWAYS know the Gospels.

8. No Pauline manuscripts have been dated to c 70 CE or earlier


The assumption that Jesus existed reduces the Pauline writings to rubble. The Gospel of Jesus himself MUST have PREDATED the Pauline Corpus and MUST have been the ORIGINAL Gospel.

Now, Paul, the monstrous LIAR claimed he got his Gospel from the resurrected DEAD.

WHAT NONSENSE!!

WHAT A PACK OF LIES!!

If Jesus did actually exist then it MUST be the Apostles of Jesus himself who KNEW the Gospel of Jesus--NOT Paul--he NEVER heard a word.

What happened to the Gospel of Jesus himself if he did exist??